According to a TechFlow report on May 2nd, Tether's quarterly report released on Friday showed that its gold purchases to back USDT reserves slowed to about 6 metric tons in the first quarter of this year, far below the 27 tons expected in October to December 2025.
The report shows that as of the end of March, USDT reserves held $19.8 billion worth of gold, equivalent to approximately 132 metric tons at the then-current market price, an increase from 126 tons at the end of December last year, but gold only accounted for 10% of the reserves. USDT reserves primarily consist of $117 billion worth of US Treasury bonds, with Bitcoin accounting for $7 billion. The current circulating supply of USDT is $189.5 billion.
According to other data, Tether's gold token XAUT is currently backed by 22 tons of gold, an increase of 6 tons since the end of December last year, with a circulating supply of $3.3 billion. The two products together hold approximately 154 tons of gold, which, if considered as central bank holdings, would rank them among the top 20 global gold reserves, second only to Brazil with 172 tons.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino previously told Reuters that the company plans to allocate 10% to 15% of its $20 billion portfolio to physical gold. Two gold traders hired by the company by the end of 2025 were laid off in March of this year, with sources saying the reason being organizational constraints created by the supervisory structure above the traders.
